For our Scotland vs. Cyprus prediction, we're going for a 2-1 win for the home side.
Scotland's EURO 2024 qualifying campaign gets underway with a game against Cyprus at Hamden Park on Saturday.
Scotland are attempting to qualify for a second straight European Championships and they enter this game in good shape having had a strong Nations League campaign that saw them promoted to Nations League A following four wins, one draw and one loss.
Their form at home has generally been very strong of late too, with Steve Clarke's side having won twelve, drawn three and lost two of their last seventeen home matches.
Scotland will be looking to exorcise the disappointment of their World Cup qualifying campaign that saw a fatigued looking side fall to a 1-3 defeat to Ukraine at the play-off stage in June in a game that was postponed several months, something the Scottish players will believe had hampered them significantly.
Scotland have won their last six head-to-head meetings with Cyprus and given the current strength of the two sides that's unlikely to change here.
They've been drawn into a tough group alongside Spain, Norway and Georgia and qualification will be very difficult. Not impossible, however, but three points is absolutely essential here.
Cyprus enter this game amidst a fairly solid run of form having won two, drawn one and lost two of their last five matches.
Most recently, Cyprus claimed an impressive 3-2 win away at Israel back in September.
The Cypriots do not have a favourable head-to-head record with Scotland having lost all seven of their encounters against the Scots.
This is an extremely tough group for Cyprus and one they will be lucky to get more than one win from. The two games against Scotland will be fixtures they are looking at with regards to winnable encounters so they'll be desperate to take a result from this. Unfortunately that is not likely, though, as they should fall to defeat here.
Don’t forget to check out the rest of our previews, tips and offers for this weekend’s action.
